It seems as though almost everyone knows "We Real Cool," Brooks' hip, slangy poem about the fate of ghetto youth who go down the path that leads to the gang-banger lifestyle. Each line ends with "we," except for the last one. The young boys cease to be in that last line: "Die soon." Though not quite as popular, many are also familiar with "The Bean Eaters" and "kitchenette building." Even "The Last Quatrain of the Ballad of Emmett Till" is semi-widely read. One of Brooks poems that deserves more acclaim, though, is "The Lovers of the Poor," possibly because it is a bit lengthier than most poetry readers' attention spans can handle. There is a lot to unpack in it.
The poem is a group portrait and its thesis, if poems can be said to have theses, is simply this: When the rich can't help the poor without being condescending, whether they are conscious of it or not, their cultural slights and accidental insults sting enough to set those they intend to help back further than they were before the rich stepped in in the first place. It is among the most powerful portraits of its kind.
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